Okuyamaru Shutara
|altbackcolor=#FFFFFF; |alttextcolor=#36454F |textcolor=#FFFFFF |height=2.2 |maxwidth=20 |tab1=Overview |tab2=Chronology (Dark and Light) |title2=Dark & Light |tabAlt=Chigusari |titleAlt=Zanpakutō Spirit }} | image = | race = | birthday = October 5 | age =9,912 | gender = Female | height = 147cm (4'10") | weight = 54kg (119lb.) | blood type = B Negative | affiliation = , | previous affiliation = | profession = | position =Protecting the | previous position = | division =Royal Guard | previous division = | partner = | previous partner =Ikiryō Kuragari | base of operations = | relatives =Sanjumarumasa Shutara (Father) Nijūyamaru Shutara (Mother) (Sister) | education = | shikai ='Chigusari' | bankai ='Hokkan Chigusari' | story debut =Bleach: Dark & Light | roleplay debut =''Chiaroscuro: Trepidation'' | japanese voice = | english voice = }} Okuyamaru Shutara (修多羅 億脚丸, Shutara Okuyamaru), later known as Duo Wen Tian (多聞天, Duō Wén Tiān) after her ascension, is a powerful and member of the Royal Guard. She is the eldest child of the Shutara family's 24th head, and elder sister of . She was the final student of Mikogami Ōtani, a man many would claim to have been the creator of . Okuyamaru was born as a in to Sanjumarumasa Shutara and his wife Nijūyamaru which marked her as the heir of the Shutara clan, then one of the . Very early on she was discovered to have a great deal of but it was irregular in that it would infect anyone around her like a virus, similiar to the Reiryoku of Hollows. In order to protect his daughter, and those her untamed spiritual energy might infect, Sanjumarumasa embedded small shards of stone through out her body which prevented the Reiryoku her soul generated from leaving. It also seemingly sealed off any hope of Wen Tian's remarkable spiritual power being put to use. She was still taught the family's various arts that had given rise to such their position within the so that she could weave the special threads of the Shutara family. But as the years went by, the sekkiseki in her body had slowly been dwindling Okuyamaru's spiritual energy. It quickly became a concern to her parents as it would eventually kill her given enough time and so they sought out anyone and anything they could to remedy the issue. As they reached wits end, they were approached by Mikogami Ōtani who claimed to be able to relieve Okuyamaru of the Sekkiseki's effects and the burden of her infectious spiritual power by teaching her the methods to control it. The family accepted. Appearance Okuyamaru is a petite woman possessed of an incredibly lithe figure that lacks even the slightest hint of musculature on her form, a gross deception given her inhuman strength. She has a fair, almost pale, complexion and her skin is marked by singular silver lines running across each of her limbs that terminate into small circles on her elbows, thighs, wrists and ankles. She has long black hair that messily runs down either side of her face, loose strands poking out every which way. The fringe of her hair is styled like that of a typical but the ends are uneven and a portion on the right side is instead laid out like spikes, giving her a disheveled look. She adorns a headdress of gold, shaped into an ornate but chaotic ring of rectangular rods. Her face is slender and unblemished, and her eyes are ovular in shape, surrounded by a set of light creases that give her a tired and pressured look. Her pupils are a lime-like green, which is given emphasis by the dark eye shadow she wears. Her nose is fairly small but possesses a well-defined bridge and the tip points downward slightly, likewise she has strongly defined lips of which the upper is naturally pressed back, giving her a form of underbite. She dresses in a standard Shinigami Shihakushō apart from the and which she replaces with a black sleeveless and backless undershirt. As a member of the Royal Guard, she also wears a bulky, white which is much too large for her, having sleeves that could cover her arms at least three times over. The haori bears the insignia of the Royal Guard on its back, and below that a zig-zagged diamond emblem. She often foregoes footwear in favour of travelling barefoot, leaving the soles of her feet covered in dirt. Personality At first glance Okuyamaru might come across as a jolly giant-like figure, she brims with joy and is eternally friendly with everyone around her. She jokes, and enthuses about the smallest of things, laughing heartily at anything that might amuse her. She greets all of her friends by wrapping them up in a bear hug, a mighty display of her vicious strength and her own lack of understanding of just how strong she is, as she often happens to crush those unfortunate enough to end up in her grasp.Dark & Light, Complication Part 1 With boundless energy and enthusiasm, she is easily the life of any party and has been known to turn many atmospheres light just by being present. Others liken her to a doting mother for how affectionate she tends to be with other people, babying them incessantly and ensuring everything is right in their world. She is incredibly carefree, happy to play around in any given situation with an attitude that can easily be misconstrued as naïveté. Not helped by her lack of an indoor voice or personal etiquette. In a word, she is eccentric. Though she would appear to be absorbed in her own imagination, there is far more to Okuyamaru than one can discern at a glance. In spite of her seeming inattentive outlook, she is actually an incredible listener, which is part of why she is treated as a mother figure. No matter the problems, no matter what they have to say, and no matter just what Okuyamaru is doing, people are able to take solace in the fact that she not only hears what they have to say, but that she is actively listening to them. Internalising it, and doing what she can to help. She offers praise, warmth, acceptance, condolence, and shelter, in such a way that it may be better to say that Okuyamaru is a woman of many faces, but most people have come to accept her treatment as genuine. She has a strong habit of remembering people's names, often as single character pet names, that allow her to keep a grasp of the many people she interacts with in Soul Society, such as Ikiryō Kuragari whom she affectionately refers to as "Ki" (キ), this is often paired with honourifics that she believes sounds cute, resulting in nicknames such as "Wa-kun" (ワ君), which is what she knows Kurokawa Tadayoshi by. History Among the Great Noble Families, only the Shutara Clan has had the honour of standing amongst the Royal Family of Soul Society. They are courtiers, and have been responsible for creating the esteemed clothing worn by the Soul King and his court since time immemorial. In the year , the family was headed by its 24th patriarch, the esteemed Sanjumarumasa Shutara, and with his wife Nijūyamaru, they had a child. Born Chiasa (千朝, One Thousand Mornings), she was at first a bright and energetic girl, gifted with incredible for her age, but as that energy matured it began to overtake her, revealing itself as having a poisonous affinity. At her age there was no means of controlling this energy from spilling out, and so not only was Chiasa's spiritual energy dangerous to herself, but a threat to everyone in the Royal Palace. With the threat of execution looming over his child, Sanjumarumasa was left with no choice but to facilitate a gruesome procedure on his daughter. With his incredible skill in sewing he managed to lace threads of stone throughout Chiasa's body. Sekkiseki is a mineral found all over Soul Society that is well known for its ability to vaporise Reishi when cut in specific ways, as is the case with the walls of the Royal Palace that may fall to defend the Seireitei. By lacing it throughout his daughter's body in a particular pattern, Sanjumarumasa was able to effectively seal away her Reiryoku preventing her from harming others or herself. However it was an imperfect solution. Chiasa was raised based on the knowledge that her life would be cut incredibly short, for her soul's ability to generate Reiryoku was greatly hindered which, coupled with the strained bonds of her body's Reishi, weakened and weakened her as she grew up. Sanjumarumasa and Nijūyamaru struggled with that fact, watching their bright adorable child slowly drain of her energy day after day until it became a hassle to even walk. In the Soul King invited several martial artists to the Royal Palace to celebrate and test their skills. Among them were the likes of Satō Shingen, , Xiang Yu, Tatsuo Takehiko, and most importantly for the Shutara clan, Mikogami Ōtani. An incredibly skilled martial artist, he was famous for his mastery of the self, which as he demonstrated before the Royal Court, allowed him to rid himself of any ailment that one could afflict upon him. Sanjumarumasa was quick to approach the man in hopes of saving Chiasa, and though Mikogami had his misgivings, he eventually accepted. He took the young child from her home in the Royal Palace and took her to the place where he trained, a hidden locale deep within the 45th District of the Eastern Rukongai, Kanekane (钟鐘, Bell Chime). Mikogami had long followed a philosophy that he would only ever teach four students, and in explaining this to the Shutara clan, he promised that Chiasa would not die, for she would be his last pupil. Within months there were vast improvements. With a focus on teachings that nurtured self control, Mikogami had taken Chiasa from being a child that could barely stand into someone who could confidently walk and run on her own. A practice which would continue until she could safely lead a life where she would not only be able to live as she wished, but where she would be able to do so without threatening herself or others with her spiritual energy. To commit to this, Mikogami had the sekkiseki threads removed from Chiasa's body before they continued their training. Together they studied the Hakushō Onigiri Style (白掌鬼切流, Hakushō Onigiri-ryū; "White Palm, Demon Cutting Style"), an early form of . Mikogami made it clear that though they would study it, the style itself was incomplete. Another of his philosophies, that the truest strength did not come from oneself but from the coming together and contributions of others towards a whole. Thus Hakushō Onigiri was incomplete because it lacked its final contributor: Chiasa. This greatly invigorated the young girl, as before this point she had been forced to live with the idea that death was always near. She had never aspired to anything, never wished for anything more than for her life to continue. As that wish had come true, she was now without meaning but Mikogami had given her something to pursue, though she was but a child. Together they trained and trained, a hundred years would pass before they moved on to the next step of Chiasa's lifelong journey. Disciple of Tonjikiha In , Mikogami officially inducted Chiasa as his pupil, bestowing upon her the title Duo Wen Tian (多聞天 Duō Wén Tiān; Lit. "He Who Hears Everything"), and introducing her to his other three pupils, each of which had been bestowed similar titles that they had begun using in place of their names. Together they were to be the four masters of Mikogami's school, the Tonjikiha (屯食派, Food and Drink School), located in the 61st Southern Rukongai District, Funaka (郛中, Inside the Earthwork). There they would train for years upon years to fulfill both theirs and Mikogami's dream. The Hakushō Onigiri school was incomplete because Mikogami wished for it to be the collective sum of not only his teachings, but those of his students, for no true martial art was the effort of a single individual. Each of his students, Chiasa included, brought something of their own to the style, and in so doing, created the four branches that would become the core of the school as a whole. This was accomplished by pressing each of his students in different ways, playing to their strengths and allowing them to overcome whatever obstacles he placed before them in their own ways. For Chiasa this was in her excellent sense of hearing, she fought with reliance on what she could hear not what she could see and this was reflected in her body language and the techniques she focused on. Another aspect was her association with poison. Her Reiryoku being as deadly as it was to herself and others had clearly left an impact on her, one that could be seen in how she attacked. Vicious grips and entangling moves that sought to slowly drain someone of their stamina or their oxygen. As Mikogami taught her, he relied on schools of similar thought, pensive, flexible styles with an approach on debilitating its victims, bringing them down from within. As time passed, Mikogami began to see it necessary to send Chiasa out into the immense expanse that was Soul Society so that she could learn more. Studying under one master and only learning what they knew was a poor way to develop one's own way, after all. As such, he bade her to take a pilgrimage, to meet and train with others all across the spiritual realms, and so she did, beginning with a trek to Mt. Tōtō (東塔山, East Pagoda Mountain) which lay beyond the Rukongai, in the most rural parts of Soul Society. What began as an uneventful trip to a barely inhabited landscape soon turned into a clash of titans when Chiasa ran afoul of two beings duking it out for supposed supremacy of the mountain. The two were monstrously powerful beings, , a warrior who could command the lightning, and , a Dragon with eight heads and eight tails. The pair had reached a standstill in their conflict, and Chiasa would serve as an unwitting thread that shifted the tides of their feud. After encountering the pair herself, and being brought up to speed on the situation by those few innocents that made the mountain their home, Chiasa decided to intervene. She proposed a competition be held by the two, contests of arms and skill that would decide who could control the mountain. She would participate as well, of course. Through some miracle of skill, and a little cheating, Chiasa was the one to come out on top, and bequeathed the mountain to the innocent Souls living there. The two deific beings eventually realised that they had been tricked, but played it off, admitting that they had been outwitted. As a token of goodwill the pair gifted Chiasa a sword, taken from the scales of Orochi and carved into shape by Susano'o, which they called Ame no Murakumo no Tsurugi (天叢雲剣, Sword of the Gathering Clouds of Heaven). ---- She was the Captain of the until around 112 years ago when she ascended to the ranks of the s in recognition of her mastery in the art of . Equipment Kōgeishi (膠芸肢, Colloidal Crafting Limbs): Across her back, Duo Wen Tian is capable of manifesting a series of skeletal arms that she can manipulate through thought with a great degree of dexterity amongst them. They are incredibly strong in spite of their relatively simple appearance, capable of the same extraordinary feats of strength that Wen Tian is. Though all of the limbs take the shape of arms Wen Tian tends to refer to them as her "Legs" (レッグ, Reggu). Like her sister, her name is literal confirmation of the amount of these limbs she is capable of producing at any one time, as such the name Okuyamaru (億脚丸, One Hundred Million Legs) is a declaration and testament to her immense skill. Wen Tian has however stated that she cannot truly form so many limbs at once, instead she believes her name is meant to clarify that she can manifest so many of these arms that counting them eventually becomes pointless. Naigen-bei (無限袂, Interminable Sleeves): The haori that Wen Tian wears is almost twice her size. It is a product of her design that was sewn in such a manner as to grant it a form of limited reality altering abilities. A set of interior pockets are capable of storing a great number of items within them, as if they existed within a separate dimension once they are placed inside. The massive sleeves of her haori are capable of withdrawing any of the items within the pockets, making it look like Wen Tian draws things from thing air. Further, the sleeves are capable of stretching to fit whatever passes through them without tearing under the strain, allowing Wen Tian to summon an immense number of her Kōgeishi arms through the sleeves without issue. Powers & Abilities Trivia *As stated her name, Okuyamaru can be taken to mean "One Hundred Million Legs" (億 (Oku), Hundred Million; 脚 (Ya), Leg; 丸 (Maru), A whole thing), whilst Shutara can be translated as "Cultivate the Sun Setting Silk" (修 (Shu), Cultivate; 多 (Ta), Sun Set; 羅 (Ra), Silk). In addition her title Duō Wén Tiān (多聞天 (多闻天) is one of the names for , the chief of the in . The characters for the name mean "Deity who hears much" or "Much hearing God". *The Wen Tian Chop technique was inspired by the Shinigami Chop used by Shinigami in the popular anime/manga series . *The secondary ability of Chigusari is based on a similiar trait of Gilgamesh's Noble Phantasm Enkidu from the visual novel . Appearances *'Bleach: Dark and Light' **''Chiaroscuro: Trepidation'' **''Chiaroscuro: Complication'' **''Chiaroscuro: Aggravation'' **''Chiaroscuro: Retribution'' References Category:Characters Category:Female Category:Shinigami Category:Former Captains Category:2nd Division Category:Royal Guard Category:Hakuda Grandmasters Category:Shunpo Masters Category:Master Swordsmen Category:Gotei 13